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Taper week 1

This week is the first taper week before the race. Like last one, it also contains a 22-miler at the end. But the overall mileage is much lower, around 52-54 miles (as opposite to 70 last week).

Usually, even if the week is relatively easy, this rest doesn’t start on Monday. On Mondays I have a very hard track workout. Tuesdays are also usually intense. For example this week I had 4 x 2000 on Monday evening with build-up every 200 meters and immediately after that a 3500+ yard swimming session on Tuesday morning.

I think I finally reached the level of tiredness I was targeting during the last month and a half. After all, the whole idea of peak weeks is to push yourself to the limit. There are several symptoms of accumulated fatigue:

Weight is higher that I expected. It is about 4-5 pounds more than “target”. Actually may be it is my new target, because I feel much stronger with those pounds inside me.

Sleeping is not ideal. It sometimes took a while for me to fall asleep. This shouldn’t happen at this training volume.

Muscles ache for the last couple of days.

Performance slightly decreased. I had hard time decreasing pace below 45 sec per 200 at the end of long intervals.

HRV is stable and low, around 7-8.

The next 2.5 weeks should eliminate all those symptoms and give me lightness, required to crush the marathon.